William Odom: the Case for Withdrawal

[Tribesman]

Any proof of this '3 nations' baloney?

Would the wording of the constitution and all the wrangling over the wording have anything to do with that "baloney" ?
How about the stated policies of the major parties in the territory ? would that be enough proof ?

The Taliban. Heard of it? They clamped down on terrorism plenty good didnt they?
Oh dear oh dear Xiahou , it may have escaped your memory but the Taliban had some very very big clampdowns on terrorism , one of the clampdowns nearly led to war with Iran .
But like America or many other countries/regimes they clamp down on terrorists they don't like and support terrorists they do like . Though just like the others they change their minds about who are the good terrorists and who are the bad ones .

Edit to add The war is against an insurgency. An almost wholly Sunni insurgency- a minority of Sunnis. The Shiites and Kurds have comparatively little involvement.

The war is a complicated mess with lots of different sides fighting for lots of different reasons , the Kurds and Shite Arabs are widely involved for their own reasons .

If I may say so, the worst mistake a leader can make is pulling out of a war in progress. - Kaiser.
If I may say so the worst mistake a leader can make is to start a war without planning , and then refuse to address the lack of planning .

[Xiahou]

The Taliban. Heard of it? They clamped down on terrorism plenty good didnt they?
Oh dear oh dear Xiahou , it may have escaped your memory but the Taliban had some very very big clampdowns on terrorism , one of the clampdowns nearly led to war with Iran .
But like America or many other countries/regimes they clamp down on terrorists they don't like and support terrorists they do like . Though just like the others they change their minds about who are the good terrorists and who are the bad ones .

I wouldnt say that worked out to our benefit, would you?

[Tribesman]

I wouldnt say that worked out to our benefit, would you?
Well I don't know , the Iranian troop deployments must have cost them a fair bit of money

[Franconicus]

Adrian,

thank you for this article.

I do not think that the Democrats will azzack the Bush position. Why? If they do the conservatives will blame them for not supporting the troops and being unpatriotic. And most of the Americans will believe this. So the Democrats will do nothing although they know that Bush is policy is a big mistake and the troops pay for it.

[Watchman]

Uh, Rabbit ? Did you know that Euro intelligence agencies are getting really worried about young fervent Muslims from their countries gone down to Iraq and coming back as graduated urban guerillas...? The place's an even better training ground than Afghanistan, really. Afghanistan is rocks and mountains; while you may learn to be a damn good hill guerilla against other hill guerillas over there, the usefulness of that is ultimately limited. In Iraq they learn hands on the dos and don'ts of urban insurgency with Western forces and agencies as their sparring partners...